The 49th Parallel [Invaders] **** (1941, Leslie Howard, Laurence Olivier, Raymond Massey, Eric Portman, Anton Walbrook, Richard George) – Classic Film Review 635

A German submarine appears from the ocean deeps in the Gulf of St Lawrence, its leader Lieutenant Hirth (Eric Portman) and his six men arrive on land to find supplies. But two RAF bombs sink the sub, the U-boat crew is stranded in northern Canada and the Germans begin a trek to the border to safety in the still-neutral US.

In the middle of WW2, Laurence Olivier was released from his wartime British Fleet Air Arm service for British writer-producer-director team Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s valuable and highly impressive Oscar-winning 1941 wartime thriller in which he tries on one of his ‘foreign’ accents as a French-Canadian trapper.

Though Olivier looks dashing and makes a sterling hero as Johnnie the Trapper, he’s effortlessly upstaged in the acting department by Portman, who gives one of his most intelligent performances as the U-boat commander travelling across Canada, Raymond Massey as a deserter called Andy Brock, Anton Walbrook as Peter and Leslie Howard as an Indian expert, Philip Armstrong Scott. The film was advertised on the original poster as ‘and introducing Miss Glynis Johns’, who plays Anna.

Pressburger won an Oscar for Best Original Story and his screenplay with Rodney Ackland was nominated, and the film was also nominated as Best Picture. It was filmed at Korda’s Denham Studios, near London, and on location in Montreal. David Lean was the film editor.

Powell and Pressburger wanted Laurence Olivier to play Clive Candy in 1943 in their The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, but he was prevented from being given leave from the British Navy by prime minister Winston Churchill as part of his attempt to stop the film being made.

Powell died on February 19 1990, aged 84.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 635

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